Born to Wander: A Boy's Book of Nomadic Adventures

Old Joe was a monster pike, who lived in a monster pond or pool, big enough almost to be called a lake, for it covered three acres of ground, and one part of it, right in the centre, was said to be deep enough to bury the village church and steeple. It was down at the bottom of this deep dark hole that Joe lived.

Now it was somewhat funny, but nobody about Grayling House – with one solitary exception, namely, Peter the butler, who had been at the mansion, man and boy, for fifty years – could tell where this monster pike had come from, or when or why he had come.

The facts are these: the loch was fed by springs, and the only outlet for the water was a lead that had to pass over a big mill-wheel, that ground oats and barley for every one in the parish. The pike could not have come over the mill-wheel. Again, he had not been there ten years, and as he weighed, to all appearance, full thirty pounds, he must have been a monster when he got there.

Captain Lyle, Leonard’s and Effie’s father, believed he had scrambled over the grass some dark, dewy night, and taken up his quarters in the loch. This was strange if true, and it might have been, because, at the time the pike first appeared, a tenant of the same kind was missed from a deep tree-shaded pool in the river.

The country people, however, would not share the captain’s belief. There was something uncanny about the beast, they averred, and the less any one had to do with him the better.

He was a very matter-of-fact pike, at all events; for no sooner had he taken possession of his new quarters than he proceeded at once to turn out all the old tenants. Or rather – to speak more to the point – he turned them in, for he ate them. Captain Lyle had, years before the reign of this king-pike, stocked the water with trout, and they had done well, but now none were ever seen.

Sometimes the pike condescended to show himself, or even to take a bait, when some person more daring and less superstitious than his fellows tried to catch him. More than once he had been pulled above the water, but disappeared again, hook and all, with a splash.

When he had swallowed a hook it was Joe’s custom to sulk for a fortnight at the bottom of his pool, and having duly digested the morsel of blue steel, he appeared again livelier and more audacious than ever.

His size was reported to be something enormous by those who had raised him. They said his head was as big as that of Farmer Kemp’s great mastiff-dog.

It was also said that Joe had once upon a time swallowed a sow and a litter of young. This tale was always retailed to strangers who happened to come to the district to fish. It was, in fact, a catch, for Joe really had done this deed; but then the sow was a guinea pig, and the young ones mere hop-o’-my-thumbs.

“Yes, Leonardie,” said Effie, “let us go and try to hook old Joe.”

So while Effie ran to the hall for the fishing tackle, her brother went and dug some great garden worms, and half an hour afterwards they were both in the middle of the lake, with the line sunk, and sitting patiently in the little boat to see whether or not Joe would condescend to bite.

Book One – Chapter Two.

Glen Lyle

“I foraged all over this joy-dotted earth,
To pick its best nosegay of innocent mirth,
Tied up with the bands of its wisdom and worth, —
And lo! its chief treasure,
Its innermost pleasure,
Was always at Home.”

    Tupper.
Scene: An old-fashioned parlour in Grayling House. The walls are hung with faded tapestry, the furniture is ancient, and a great fire of logs and peat is burning on the low hearth. In front lies a noble deerhound. At one side, in a high-backed chair, sits a lady still young and beautiful. Some lacework rests on her lap, and she listens to one who sits near her reading – her husband.

Captain Lyle reading —

“Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking;
Dream of battle-fields no more,
Days of danger, nights of waking.

“In our isle’s enchanted hall,
Hands unseen thy couch are strewing,
Fairy strains of music fall,
Every sense in slumber dewing.

“Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er,
Dream of fighting fields no more;
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking,
Morn of toil nor night of waking.”

Lyle looked up. There were tears in his wife’s blue eyes.

“Is it not beautiful, Ethel?” he said. “There is the true ring of martial poesy about every line that Walter writes.”

“Yes,” said Ethel, with a sigh, “it is beautiful; but oh, dear Arnold! I wish you were not quite so fond of warlike verses.”

“Ethel, I am a soldier.”

“Yes, poor boy, and must soon go away to the wars again. I cannot bear to think of it, Arnold. When last you were gone, how slowly went the time. The days and weeks and months seemed interminable. I do not wish to think of it. Let us be happy while we may. Put away that book.”

Lyle did as he was told. He took one of his wife’s fair tresses in his hand and kissed it, and looked into her face with a fond smile.

Man and wife – but lovers yet.

“Heigho!” he said, getting up and pulling aside the heavy crimson curtains to look out, “heigho! these partings must come. It must be sad sometimes to be a soldier’s wife.”

“It would be less sad, Arnold, if I could share your wanderings.”

“What, Ethel! you, my tender, too fragile wife? Think what you say, child.”

She let the work that she had resumed drop once more in her lap, and gazed up at him as he bent over the high-backed chair.

“Why not I as well as others?”

“Our children, dear one. My beautiful Effie and bold Leonard.”

“They have your blood and mine in their veins, Arnold. They are wise and they are brave.”

Arnold mused for a little.

“And we,” he said, “have few friends, and hardly a relative living.”

“All the more reason, Arnold, I should be near you, that we should be near each other. No, dear, I have thought of it all, planned it all; and if your colonel will but permit Captain Lyle’s wife to be among the chosen few who accompany their gallant husbands to the seat of war, I shall rejoice, and you may believe me when I say our children shall not be unhappy.”

Captain Lyle put his arm around her, and drew her closer towards him.

“I never refused any request you made, Ethel, and if the colonel, as you say, will but permit, I will not refuse you this.”

“Oh, thank you, Arnold! thank your kind and good unselfish heart. You have indeed taken a load off mine. I feel happy now, I feel younger, Arnold; for truly I was beginning to grow old.”

She laughed a half-hysteric laugh of joy.

“You may read to me now,” she added, re-seating herself in the high-backed chair, “and it can be all about war if you like.”

He took up the book and commenced at random —